


This Too Shall Pass

by Extrinsic_Demagoguery



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Ableist Language, Abuse, Briefly and contained within a Bible quote, Character Study, Child Abuse, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied threat of molestation, Masturbation, Religious Fanaticism, Religious Guilt, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, The life of Credence Barebone, Though I admit it is brief, blink and you miss it - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 09:01:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9172219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Extrinsic_Demagoguery/pseuds/Extrinsic_Demagoguery
Summary: He is four when Mary Lou saves him.He is only very little, he thinks, but he is no coward.





	

_The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them;_

_and the desert shall rejoice,_

_and blossom as the rose_

 

He is four when Mary Lou saves him. Her skin is thin and hot, soft, clamping around his wrist to pull him _up_. Like this he is tall, chin angled down and brushing against her pleated skirt. The fabric is dull and gray and he aches to press into it but he would not, wouldn't dare. With a jolt he is made to look upward but he follows willingly, meets her fingertips and dutifully holds her gaze. She saves him, just like this.

“How old is the boy?” She asks.

Four. He is four, and he is saved.

 

There was a name, once, a nickname that popped off lips and made them laugh. He doesn’t remember. It isn’t his, not anymore. Mary Lou calls him Credence, sweeps the flat of her hand against his shoulders and smiles, tight-lipped. It is the last of its kind, or perhaps just the last he remembers. She gives—earnestly, endlessly, he knows this; so he musn’t forget it—and demands only his obedience to God. And that old, old, dark name. That cursed name.

He is only very little, he thinks, but her sharp eyes dare him to strive for greater things. He is only so _very_ little, but he is no coward. There is nothing left for him to miss here. Nothing at all. It is easy to go, and he does.

In her hand his is cold and weak, but solid still, scrambling with a scrubbed thumb to pinch her sleeve.

There are others inside. They fall to their knees and rock back onto their heels, silently imploring with palms squeezed together. Credence has never seen anything like it. These children do not play. They hold themselves in tight form and sway toward a hungry man pinned to a cross. Mary Lou introduces them each with a soft, quiet voice.

She gives endlessly, he knows this. All these little children have been saved.

That night he finds wool fibers under his nails from her coat, wedged deep.

 

_Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees_

 

When it finally happens, Credence is not quite five. It comes out like a giggle, his fingers spasming over a miniature book of psalms. The words tingle and the letters begin to dance, fat and wobbly, pushing each over the other until the page is nothing more than gibberish. He waves his hand, marveling as the text follows, chasing his lead. This is God’s work, Credence decides, and he is blessed. He _is_ saved. He is filled with His light, like Mary Lou promised he would be.

She is watching like she is always watching. Credence warbles, jubilant, lifting the Good book and grinning so wide his chapped lips crack in the center. Expressionless, she steps forward, curling her fingernails deep into her fists. She is angry, and he—

The little book bursts into flames.

Credence yelps and drops it, staring aghast at the burning pages crumbling at his feet.

“Mama, help!” he shrieks, carving distance between himself and the unspeakable offense. “Help, mama, please—“Credence wails until the air dies in his throat, back colliding with the musty wallpaper that lines her hallways. He crumples, squeezing at the sides of his shorn head in terror.

“Please, please” he whispers, confused. She is there, kneeling down. She knows what to do. 

Mary Lou saves him, just like this.

His hands are still practicing buttons and buckles, so she shows him how, tenderly guides his little hands over the clasp. The leather is heavy in his hand, stiff, but it rests easily in hers as though it was made to be there. She is a vessel of His love, patient to the very quick, and sets herself earnestly to this Good work. He knows this.

“Kneel, Credence.” She demands gently, and he does it, trusts her to take his fear away. The floorboards squeak under his slight weight as he shifts, his hands open for her inspection. There is no tell-tale mark left by the flames, though he feels charred. He knows he is dirty by the way Mary Lou’s eyes flicker over the small stretch of flesh, her thumb scrutinizing each of his digits. He knows. He knows. She strikes him, suddenly, stilling him with her hand balled up around his scruff. He _knows_ , but he is weak, and his apologies bubble out like desperate incantations. Mary Lou hushes him, lashing the fragile skin of his wrists until it splits. Blood trickles down to pool in the well of his crooked fingers, dripping off his knuckles.

He is only little. He is only so _very_ little.

 

_Let him sit alone and keep silence, because He hath laid it upon him._

 

There is wickedness inside him, a spoiled soul that churns its rot up and _up_ and—not out, no, never out. Mary Lou has humbled him, done with his base transgressions all she can. His birth mother, he learns, was wicked too. A witch, born of the same depraved stock that might burn a holy book just by holding it. He does not remember her, nor anything, really, before Mary Lou. Not anymore. All he cares to know is what can be done to extinguish the darkness inside him that threatens to spill out. What can be done to make him good. Mary Lou is a calm, patient teacher. There is hope for him yet as he and the other children pioneer the dusky, sooty streets of New York City with their cautious hands folded around stacks of fliers. It is God’s work, tedious and cold, but there is great comfort in that suffering. He knows this. He must. Credence bravely meets the eyes of passer-bys, offering rain-wrinkled slips of paper with unshaking hands. No one takes them, and their eyes dart away. A small child passes holding a warm saffron bun—he can see the steam rising off it still. She flutters by, utterly oblivious of him, focused entirely on her prize. He wonders, sometimes, if anyone can actually see him at all. Behind them Mary Lou is illuminated, triumphal. Credence can hardly look at her, these days, though he tries. She calls out to the street with extended arms, impassioned voice bouncing off concrete intersections. Mary Lou’s words are harsh but they are true, they are law. The city does not tremble before her, but it will. How could it not?

There is cold bile in his throat and the mass inside him pulses, but he knows how to swallow it down. It is a long and lonely road to salvation, but Credence knows he must endure it. There is no other choice.

Credence is twelve, and he is a Barebone.

 

_I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of His wrath_

 

The beatings grow more frequent but so too does the exaltation of divine abreaction, sins purged from that corrupt flesh as she whips it.  For these fleeting moments he is whole, he is solid again, forehead sweating stains into her wallpaper as the sin is wrung from him.

 

_My mortal skin hath He wasted away; He hath broken my bones_

 

He holds it in the pale mornings, in his mouth on Sundays. He drowns it in scalding water and soothes it with a wet, cool cloth. It skitters around his toes and in his hair, playing in his throat. When she beats him, it shakes, it bites. He takes it to bed with him, draws his knees up and up and _up_ until his nose is wedged between them, eyes pressed against them hard and he can see stars behind his eyes. It is a heavy weight, but he keeps it close, soothing the beast that shrieks and knocks its wrath inside him. Credence breathes, and he breathes, and he _breathes_ until his lungs are ballooned and burning and his eyes are paralyzed behind their lids and the moon is dancing and the witches howl and the beast thrashes and it snarls and the sun throbs and throbs and fire pricks at his fingertips and Credence is burning, he’s _burning_ and the children scream and they scream and they scream and they scream and they scream and

 

_Even when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer_

 

It’s a sticky summer when Credence dies, just a little. He cannot draw a full breath without succumbing to fits, even when Modesty takes care to pound her small fists against his back. Whatever it is that he is choking on is lodged in the very middle of his throat, leaking bitter saliva against his tongue. He swallows and swallows but his mouth is foul like the rest of him, tangled uselessly in a nest of white sheets. Mary Lou collars him with a cool white cloth, but does not linger. There is endless work to be done, endless. His guts feel lukewarm inside him despite the balmy air as Mary Lou presses her hand along his front, pausing at his belt.

“Ma?” He croaks weakly, turning listlessly to face her. He knows better than to tell her no.

Mary Lou’s fingers are short and soft, unadorned, nails trimmed. There is nothing to do but watch as she hovers over the front of his trousers, slowly withdrawing away from him.

“You’re becoming a man now, Credence.” She says, expressionless. It is not what he expected to hear, and has not the foggiest how to respond.

“I’m sorry, ma.” He tries. It is all he can think of.

She is disgusted.

 

Credence prays. His belly gnaws with hunger and he trembles into the divine. He sinks to his knees and he despairs in its familiarity, the way the pulpy wood floor gives just so under his tucked knees. He settles, rubbing his scarred palms together until they creak and clasp. His hands don’t work as well as they used to.

 _Please_ , he prays. _Help me._

He takes his punishment with a bowed head, staring pointedly at his shoes. Silence, she says, makes even the greatest fool seem wiser. He does not utter a solitary sound while she lashes across his spine, her aim trying for uniformity. The darkness inside him howls, bouncing around his hollow gut as she places a light touch between his shoulderblades, tipping his face down to the floor. Credence sucks in a breath and waits.

She saves him, just like this. Just like this.

 

_Let him offer his cheek to the one who would strike him; let him be filled with shame_

 

Credence is seventeen and he has never had a friend. He covets ravenously and though it terrifies him he cannot stop himself—he won’t. Personal affairs of the heart are best kept between a man and God, he knows this. Oh, he knows. But his soul and his limbs are greedy, defiant, aching to be touched. The beast has space to roam where his belly’s been gouged out, and this is easier; oh God, it is gentler. It is so much easier to let his eyes roam bodies, seeking the pleasure of muscle and fat and grit. Wherever he looks there are unfamiliar lines; skirts that do not sweep but bounce, wide-brimmed hats flattened by the wind, the creases in a man’s suit. And it is rotting-sweet, Lord forgive him, does he _want._ Credence wants all of the time, now, wants like he has never wanted before. To be touched softly just the once, perhaps, if it did not trouble them. Whoever they might be. Whoever could stand to do it.

He’d beg if he thought it would do him any good at all.

Mary Lou’s circle grows wider. The quiet church gapes around hordes of dirty children and somber well-wishers who pocket leaflets and scratch dates into their pocketbooks. Chastity takes her mother’s side in sacred solidarity, folding her unmarred hands politely out of view as strange men gawk at the spectacle of the Barebones. Beside them he is tall and awkward, discreetly hunching himself further back until eyes no longer touch him. This is what Mary Lou wants, Credence thinks. Like Jeremiah she yokes herself with these odd fancies for public display—the ludicrous flames that decorate their banners, caging strangers with her bizarre appeals. Their laughter feeds her righteous indignation, proof that they are suffering sacrosanct for God. They are freaks. He is a freak. All the same, there is a certain curious nature attracted to what Mary Lou has to offer. They find her easily and fill her pews, nodding vigorously as she recounts the strange occurrences throughout the city. Everyone’s felt it, seen it. Smelled it. Something dark is brewing in the heart of New York City, something unspeakably unholy.

For the first time in his life, Credence yearns for solitude.

 

_Say to them that are of a fearful heart, be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompence; He will come and save you_

 

The first time Credence meets Mr. Graves, he is in a terrible hurry. For as much fear as he has for Mary Lou, there is a kind of solemn comfort in knowing precisely what one is about to receive. The beating will come whether or not he dawdles, given that he’s already late. He’s armed with a parcel of soup bones and unscrubbed potatoes when he sees something strange—very strange indeed. A distinguished looking man sporting a long cashmere coat simply _appears_ very much out of nowhere, shoving something into his pocket without breaking eye contact with the horizon. Credence falters, glancing around to see if anyone else noticed what he had. The street is crowded with pedestrians and yet no one else has so much as looked in the man’s general direction. _A witch,_ his mind supplies automatically, though he supposes there must be a more feasible explanation.

 _You made the letters dance_ , it whispers.

Credence shifts the groceries higher up and holds them tighter, unable to tear his eyes away from the strange man crossing the curb. He is regal, tall, dark hair peppered lightly with gray and slicked back to form a pleasing point at the nape of his neck. The same wicked sensation that coils up inside him at night swells twofold in him now, urging his steps toward the stranger. Men like that turn heads, yet none do, as though Credence is the only person alive who can see him. It’s enough to keep him rooted to the spot, fingers dimpling the lumpy parcel in his grip. The man is walking away from him, and yet…

The man looks over his shoulder and nods. Credence squeezes his arms until he can feel the dull curves of the soup bones digging into his chest, wishing faintly that he could press tightly enough to burst and disappear. It is a new feeling, to be seen, to be noticed. He follows, drawing his shoulders up nearly to his ears against the wind. It occurs to him that he ought to be afraid, but the notion is fleeting. Pain is ordinary and it is inexorable. Should the man wish him any harm, he would have to draw it upon himself first. That, he fears, is all too likely and hardly worth fretting over. Credence has already lost track of the man by the time he’s crossed the curb, trying and failing to seek out the peculiarity of a bare-headed man among the sea of hats.

Percival Graves, as he later introduces himself, finds Credence first. And oh, merciful God, he keeps on finding him, just like this.

 

_Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped_

 

Credence is nineteen and he would do anything Mr. Graves asks of him. The fact that he cannot seem to manage the solitary task bestowed upon him is humiliating, but there is woefully little for him to go off of. A child, a child…a special child, powerful, _different._ Mary Lou’s sea of orphans ebbs and flows, their little bodies gathered in stinking masses for supper and disappearing just as quickly onto the street. Credence watches dutifully, speaks to the children in hushed tones when Mary Lou is otherwise preoccupied. Mr. Graves trusts him not to squander time, yet there is no shaking his own insufficiency. He is quite dull, he knows, and weak-willed. And this, well—it is sin enough to conspire with witches, but the exquisite agony of the man’s company leaves Credence completely bereft of moderation. He has taken to rutting slowly against his bedsheets at night, mouthing at his wadded up pillow to stifle the horrors splitting his lips apart. The darkness inside him thuds like a second heartbeat as he takes his pleasure greedily, keeping his hands firmly gripped to his wrought-iron bedframe. And he thinks, he thinks, _thinks_ of Mr. Graves until his brain is numb mush and his body is stiff and panting in great lungfuls of damp air. During their sordid meetings Mr. Graves touches him like he is something precious, angling his broad hands to slide under Credence’s jaw to cup his face. Oh, God, how he looks at him— _looks_ at him like there is something to be seen. Credence comes, just like this, white-knuckled and humping his mattress like a ghastly beast. He curls up knee-to-chin after his incident, gulps in the magnified silence and prays that Mary Lou did not hear. Credence breathes, and he breathes, and he _breathes_ until his lungs fill and deflate, soft, and his heart slows its pace and there is silence, glorious silence, and the whispered promise of absolution.

Mr. Graves saves him, just like this.

_Let him put his mouth in the dust, perhaps there is hope_

 

Mr. Graves keeps a light grip on his wrist, thumbing his locked fingers open to reveal where Mary Lou beat him. Part of him wishes to tell the man that this is the very least of it, and furthermore that he is entirely sure he deserved it this time. There are pink lines stretching over his palms where magic had previously healed his wounds, and this…this is not _sin_ , this is sacred. Despite all of Credence’s shortcomings, Mr. Graves still heals him. There is nothing in the world Credence could possibly do to repay him for this kindness, but he knows he would scourge the earth at his command. It is something. Not enough, but something.  

“Find the child.” Mr. Graves whispers at his throat, breath tickling the shell of Credence’s ear. He wants to cry, wants to beg, wants to tuck himself in the whirl of Mr. Graves’s coat as he disappears. Instead, he does nothing at all, twitching as he fights the urge to follow the man’s retreating hand with the round of his cheek. He is gone. Being left behind, he finds, is a lonelier fate than friendlessness, but God—oh, God, it is feverish, it is _alive_. Falling to his knees, Credence smacks the slimy bricks by his bowed head and allows himself a broken plea, smearing mud down the sleeves of his jacket.

But there is hope.

 

Credence can feel the nightmare bloating under his skin, more animated than it has ever been. Something was left behind, long ago, some memory that teases him with sinful warmth toward—what? The beast demands he seek it out, but there is nothing in him. He is wrung out, useless, dead magic sticky and heavy in his fingertips. Still it barks and howls, thrashing about like it can push the cursed sludge out of his pores anyway. It is all he can do anymore to lay like a fetus, ankles locked, protecting his innards like they’re on the cusp of spilling out his middle. Like Mr. Graves, it wants him to triumph. It wants him to show Mr. Graves, show the world, what exactly he can do.

That he is the worst sort of freak.

_Serve the Lord with fear and celebrate his rule with trembling_

 

“Please” he begs, letting it burst out of his mouth unbidden for the first time since childhood. “Please, help me.” Credence thrusts his body forward as if he can shake the nauseating wad of grief out of him, but it only lodges deeper. Like an illustration of one of Mary Lou’s serpentine demons his jaw is locked open, heaving, spittle dribbling down onto the cold floor. What he has done...it is grotesque, the most unspeakable sin. Credence heaves out a Godless sound, heart blistering at the shared sense of relief and despair. He killed her—but—he was only a child, only so _very_ little, and he made the letters dance and burst with pride and watched as the sun tilted and scattered and the room closed in and his eyes were shut and her hands were soft against his and the leather sliced the air and then his flesh, child’s flesh, burning, burning, and oh, God, he is sorry, he is so _sorry_ , he is so terribly sorry, sorry,

Mr. Graves strikes him hard.

Everything is very still, very quiet. When Mr. Graves speaks again, Credence listens intently. This is what he deserves. He knows this, he must. He knows. He will be good. He will, he _will_. The man’s face has never looked this way before, twisted with disdain, drained of color. It is no matter, they have found the child. Credence wobbles his head—this is wrong, this is terribly wrong, but his gullet closes around the words and he hasn’t the energy to wrangle impudence. Following him is easy, as much as it pains him to drag his feet across the rubble of his own creation. The sting of his cheek is reminder enough of his place behind the man, which he slips into with trembling form. The lines of Mr. Graves’s body are sharp even in dim silhouette, towering over him as he ascends the stairs. Something is coming. Something terrible is coming.

 

Credence is nearly twenty when they kill him.

 

_Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay his life down for his friends_

 

“Now, then,” comes a voice. “You can come out now, if you’d like to.”

Driven by desperate instinct, Credence could not hope to recount what steps he’d taken to end up in Newt Scamander’s cabin. Impossible images flit through his mind in shredded ribbons completely out of order and, subsequently, quite useless.  It doesn’t stop him from trying to piece together how he’d come to intrude, but there is only bodily sensation and terror to inform his current circumstance. He does remember this man with shocking clarity, but context is broken. From the look on the man’s face, he remembers Credence, too.

“I’m sorry” Credence manages, still huddled in the corner, half his body squashed by a small wardrobe. “I’m so sorry.” He whispers, and it is hardly audible this time. He is tired—God, he is tired, nursing invisible wounds around his abdomen and chest with pressure from his torn sleeves. The man does not move toward him, only pauses, looking about the room with interest before settling himself with his knees splayed upon his little cot. He is as Credence remembers, mostly, though calmer now. Above his pale complected, freckled face is a shock of red curls, each spectacularly out of place. His body is still and his eyes are focused somewhere above Credence’s head, though he still feels attention centered upon himself. It’s uncanny to be looked at but not pinned by a stare, and it allows him a moment to scan over the man’s body quickly before hiding his face in his knees. He looks—kind. He looks so kind. It hurts like nothing else ever has, but not _more,_ only…

“Please.” Credence hiccups, fighting the collapse of his gutted body. The beast is quiet and it is trembling, as small as a child, utterly unable to fill out the space it once hollowed out. “Oh, please.” He whimpers out the words like a prayer, curling in tighter on himself as the whole of him begins to pulse with anguish. Without permission his body gives in like an overburdened muscle releasing its obligation, and he is crying. There is nothing in the world but him and his frightened darkness, dying inside him as it curls morosely around his heart. Credence weeps louder than he has ever dared to, shaking with the strain of it.

“May I come closer?” The man’s voice breaks through and Credence keens hopelessly, body slumping over as the wardrobe inexplicably scoots out of place. Magic, he presumes, though he cannot bear to open his swollen eyes. His consent gurgles in his throat like vomit, and instead he tries for a nod.

“You’ve nothing to be sorry for.” The man says as he shifts onto the floor. “Nothing at all, Credence.” He feels the words whispered into his hair, followed by the alien sensation of warm limbs wrapping around him. It is a lie, Credence knows this, he knows, he knows, he knows. And yet, just as it always is, it is wretchedly easy to follow, and he closes the space between their bodies until he is planted firmly between the smaller man’s legs. The man rocks forward and back, never minding that Credence is surely causing his lower back a great deal of pain.

Credence breathes, and breathes, and _breathes_ , fingers scrambling to twist at the cuffs of the man’s long blue coat. Later, he’ll find blue bits of wool lodged underneath his fingernails.

“Would you like to see inside my suitcase?” He asks, hushed, like it is a secret.

Newt Scamander saves him, just like this.

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive me, I know next to nothing about religion. If it sounded like I was talking out my ass the whole time, it's because I was!
> 
> Peace be with you, and a happy new year to those who celebrated it recently. My new years resolution is to learn how to write fix-its so I can help console our darling Credence properly. 
> 
> Also, if you noticed any glaring errors or have a bone to pick with my purple prose, do let me know! I am desperately seeking a beta.


End file.
